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concerned it’s your problem. Not mine.’
    Lieutenant Harris took a stick of chewing gum out of the breast-pocket of his coat, unwrapped it, and thoughtfully folded it into his mouth. With his eyes lowered, he fashioned the silver foil into a tiny model airplane.
    â€˜The
Spirit of St Louis
,’ he said, holding it up. ‘I can make the
Enola Gay,
too, but that takes at least four wrappers.’
    â€˜How did they die?’ Jim asked him.
    â€˜I thought you weren’t interested.’
    â€˜Of course I’m interested. It’s just that I don’t want to find myself all tangled up in anything weird. Especially anything
dangerous
and weird.’
    Lieutenant Harris cleared his throat. ‘Robert and Sara were found in a beach property at Santa Monica that belonged to Robert Tubbs’ parents. Mr and Mrs Tubbs had no idea that they were there, and Robert wasn’t allowed to use the property without their specific consent. They weren’t even aware that he had a key. The Tubbs’ maid found them. She was supposed to clean the place up for a dinner party they were holding this weekend. She smelled something as soon as she opened the door. When she went into the bedroom she found their bodies, burned.’
    â€˜Terrible,’ said Dr Ehrlichman. ‘Absolutely terrible. Their parents are devastated.’
    â€˜Was it an accident?’ asked Jim. ‘Were they – what? – smoking in bed or something?’
    Lieutenant Harris shook his head.
    â€˜So what was it? Murder?’ Jim paused and frowned. ‘Don’t tell me they set fire to themselves deliberately.’
    â€˜No, no, it doesn’t look like a suicide pact. There was no accelerant on the premises, anyhow – nothing they could have used to burn themselves with. It’s kind of hard for me to explain it to you.’
    â€˜I’m not so sure that I want you to.’
    â€˜Look, I can totally appreciate why you don’t want to get involved, Mr Rook – and if you insist that you don’t want to help, then I’ll have to accept your decision, won’t I? But there are certain aspects of this case that even the Crime Scenes Unit can’t make head nor tail of, and neither can I.’
    â€˜And what makes you think that I’ll be able to? I’m not a detective.’
    â€˜I know you’re not. But you’re au fait with all of this supernatural stuff, aren’t you?’
    Jim took off his glasses and rubbed his eyes. ‘Lieutenant, when I was ten or eleven years old I suffered from pneumonia and I nearly died. Ever since then, I’ve had a heightened sensitivity to what you might call
presences
– spirits, or souls, or whatever you want to call them. I can see things that other people can’t see – or don’t notice, to be more accurate. But that’s the whole story, and it doesn’t make me the world’s expert on everything bizarre. I’m sure you’ll find that there’s a perfectly logical explanation for the way these two young people got themselves burned, even if it isn’t immediately obvious.’
    â€˜You haven’t seen the crime scene.’
    â€˜I don’t want to, either.’
    â€˜Well,’ said Lieutenant Harris, ‘it’s your decision. But I can’t see any logical explanation for what happened to Robert Tubbs and Sara Miller – none whatsoever – and I’ll bet you a double enchilada at Tacos Tacos that you can’t, either.’

Three
    J im followed Lieutenant Harris down the ramp that led to the beach, and parked his aging gold Lincoln Continental on the sand. It was a warm, windy afternoon, and the seagulls hung suspended in the air as if they had been captured in a still photograph. There were already four squad cars parked outside the beach house, as well as an ambulance from the coroner’s department, two sport-utility vehicles from the Crime Scenes Unit,